For those of you who don't know, I'm spending a month in Germany this summer (in Magdeburg, kinda near Berlin), and today I finally got to play some frisbee with the locals. :) This blog post chronicles the event: After finding my way to the fields with public transit (which required speaking broken German with a nice woman on a bike and a grumpy woman at the tram stop), I put on my cleats and met Inga, one of the two girls at the practice. I say practice because it was a practice with the local team, Schleudertrauma (translation: whiplash). It was the most intense practice I have ever had and really awesome. We warmed up with straight, IO, and OI backhands and forehands, and then hammers (10 of each). Then we did soooo much shuffling (while staring at a specific target) and agility ladder stuff. I thought I was gonna die. Then we did this great deep drill where each person takes a turn hucking for the whole team, but sprinting in between hucks. The whole team had beautiful forehand and backhand hucks (I need to work on my flick hucks....) and there was no difference between the men and the women (always nice). It was a bit intimidating, but I felt challenged in all the right ways. Then (finally) we set up endzones and played 5-on-5 scrimmage, which was the most intense scrimmage I've ever played. They had three handlers and two poppers but with man defense, and no one stopped running. Ever. Also I'm pretty sure the stall count never got above 3. (although that could be because they say "stalling.... 1.... 2.....") It was beautiful ultimate where everyone on the team touched the disc every point and it made me realize how totally doable that is. :) I was also quickly reminded of the importance of sidelines and communicating on the field (in a language you can fluently understand...) :P After practice (which ended at 9pm, because it doesn't get dark here till 10:30 or so) they all thanked me for coming, and one of the guys on the team actually offered to drive me home (a big deal in Germany). They practice twice a week and there is another women's team practice tomorrow and a pickup game on Saturday. I'm in heaven (but my out-of-shape body isn't...). To any incoming freshmen who might be reading this, I should just mention that joining the Swarthmore frisbee team my freshman year (after having not played a sport since middle school, and only having thrown a disc once or twice) has actually changed my life in a lot of wonderful ways. I have made some amazing friends, learned a ton, and never been happier. So come to the first practice -- you won't regret it. :) Frisbee grüße, Abigail ([email protected] <-- email me!)
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Interesting question to consider in the recruiting season: which sport best prepares you for Ultimate?
http://www.gazette.com/sports/ultimate-141385-grew-players.html |
Who are we?We are the Swarthmore Warmothers, the Women's Ultimate Frisbee team at Swarthmore College. Read our blog to track our progress this upcoming year! Archives
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